Monday, April 09, 2007

Know

The important thing with knowledge is having contact with the higher planes of knowledge. It’s not about thinking, or reading, but about receptivity. Speech is an expression, one that contains a mix of elements. For instance there is what is being said and the quality of the expression, word choice, rhythm, effective grammar, aptness of metaphor, as well as the emotional tone in which speech is delivered. This is apart from the content of the speech.

Then there is effect of the speech, the intent behind it. Its force. If you are being intimidated by someone, saying “Please, don’t touch me.” Is probably less effective then “Don’t touch me leave me alone!” Effectiveness of speech also enters into the broader spiritual action behind the speech.

This is also true of spiritual knowledge. A teacher may not impart all of their knowledge, but rather say what is needed and most effective to the audience. It is obvious in the flow that we use economy of words, and rather than expound ten or more alignments on each pose, we use one or two with an eye to making corrections. A student’s ability to act on more than one or two cues and remain with the breath is the governing principle.

A theoretical physicist working with quantum mechanics may or may not be able to talk to another physicist working at a super collider. Their areas are too divergent. Pretty simple, but there needs to be a common basis of understanding built up over time. In spiritual matters this relates to experiences and realizations including fine sentiments. Emotions such as compassion and blissfulness can be demonstrated, the feeling shared if their is sufficient development. A yearning in the heart for bliss is awakened as a teacher delves deep, but there needs to be an opening, just as we become more intimate with friends over time.

With knowledge there are gradations. Simple mental knowledge is limited to discussing what words mean, the logical coherency and the consistency of the play of ideas. With higher mental knowledge it reflects spiritual ideas. There is an appropriateness. We may talk about timeless knowledge, but the knowledge enters into the relative world for the purpose of acting as a force upon it. Knowledge is an instrument of the divine will, the divine word is speech.

In listening to someone speak about spiritual understanding there is often a play of light involved. The subtle level of speech can involve all sorts of phenomenon. One common one is people who are mentally focused, who live in predominantly mental world are used to the constant polemics. They actually pull mental energy out of the atmosphere making it difficult to think. This makes them appear smarter as you can not process or respond to what they say because they disrupt the contact, the receiving of the energy of the mental worlds. They will have ideas that can seem brighter than they actually are. Partly this is do to the need to win. If you live in a world of competitive ideas, competitive voices and are under pressure to produce thoughts…

Many people encounter the experience of hearing or reading a spiritual discussion and feel like it is expression what they all ready know. That is because they are already in contact with the spiritual idea, or the spiritual plane, whether it be a higher mental plane or above where that idea comes from. Contacting the plane will lead to the flow of consciousness that generates the ideas and puts them thought like into your head.

When the mind is silent and receptive you can begin to feel where the speech is coming from. It is not a process of understanding categories, and then assigning them. It is more a feel and intuitive discrimination of the energy. You can sense the power of the truth of an idea, and its limitations. Someone can in the course of discussion use the same idea, but when they are connected to its realization it will appear bright and lifting, and then later use the word as a reference and it appears to be a mental idea. You can feel the difference, distinguish the plane of origination and sense the potency or limited action.

You can listen to someone and start to pick out areas where the ideas are mixed in quality. For instance they may have a profound insight into compassion or the energy, but not have the same fullness in the idea of attachment. One can also surrender and be guided in reading or surfing the net coming across that which is needed.

What is important is not who is coming from the higher plane, but rather the effectiveness of fulfilling the work of transformation. You can have wondrous insight and see clearly, but be limited in your expression, not because of lack of skill in writing or speaking, but because of the audience. You can also have profound understanding, but communicate only rudimentary ideas. Symbols and poetry may have the ability to fix and build up a structure for further advancement. They may speak more effectively across levels of knowledge and development. They can more easily invoke experience and contact with real ideas existing in subtle form in their native planes.

All the time though this has to over come the obstacles of the need to be recognized, and taste. For instance you can be distracted while speaking by the power of your own words, or have anxiety about whether you are saying things well. You may also have a need to be heard for the attention that it gives or the place you feel you must establish among others. Often being silent and not speaking is a first step towards the witness. The same is true if you feel the energy coming through in an area that does not appeal to you. The sense of taste blocks us from listening to others as well as our self expression. If you don’t like country music you can not hear it for what it is. People can be very passionate about defending their tastes. They confuse their own impulses for being open and letting the divine come through. It is not enough to control and be discriminating in taste, one has to find the divine in all that is.

Give the need to be recognized in speech to others. Be the spiritual action. There is nothing to be accomplished through talking or writing, no idea that you don't have or to be mastered, only the spiritual flow of existence, vast, conscious, blissful.

1 Comments:

"They actually pull mental energy out of the atmosphere making it difficult to think. This makes them appear smarter as you can not process or respond to what they say because they disrupt the contact, the receiving of the energy of the mental worlds. They will have ideas that can seem brighter than they actually are. Partly this is do to the need to win. If you live in a world of competitive ideas, competitive voices and are under pressure to produce thoughts…"

Isn't this relevant to the mental dissonance caused by the constant use of fallacy? In a time of war the fallacy of composition, of division and appeal to emotion are rampant in jingoist 'arguments'. For those without an analytical skillset they fall into these word traps constantly.

I remember once when we were rooming on Dodge street where I said that there is an irrational underpinning to all rational argumentation. You said, "Hold that thought.", and darted off. Well I guess I finally got to let it go!